Meghan Markle battered sexist advertising 25 years ago

At this rate we’re soon going to be short of pundits about advertising and its impact (or not) on the world but help may be at hand. Meghan Markle, who’s getting married to someone or other soon, made her bid as an 11 year old back in 1993, taking P&G to task for an Ivory Clear ad that assumed that only women did the dishes. And, boy, were they horrible dishes.

So P&G changed the ad’s wording from women to people – how radical was that? These days they’d just say: “P&G takes these complaints very seriously…”

Must get a certain adman of my acquaintance – last seen gleefully clutching his invitation – to ask if she’d like to do Desert Island Ads.

About Stephen Foster

Stephen is a former editor of Marketing Week and London Evening Standard advertising columnist. He wrote City Republic for Brand Republic and is a partner in communications consultancy The Editorial Partnership.